Monday, April 19, 2010

Such tweet sorrow, indeed

Yes, Romeo and Juliet - or rather R & J - have joined twitter. The Royal Shakespeare Company has launched a five-week "adventure" called "Such Tweet Sorrow" (props for the title, btw) in which Romeo and Juliet will unfold on twitter, Youtube, and other digital media. Charlotte Wakefield, this production's Juliet, or rather @julietcap16, has already begun tweeting, but Romeo is still apparently "too busy on his Xbox." Michael Boyd, artistic director of the RSC, says that the Diane-Paulus-like experiment "Allows our actors to use mobiles to tell their stories in real time and reach people wherever they are in a global theater." Oooo, he said global. That's so 2004! But I'm afraid the effort reminds me, as The Donkey Show does, of that 70's porn movie where the actress reads Joyce's Ulysses while she's being pounded. . . with Shakespeare himself in the role of that actress . . .